Brick Books Award News

If you read Canadian poetry, you likely have some brilliant and beautifully designed books published by Brick Books on your shelves. Brick was founded in 1975 by Stan Dragland and Don McKay and its mandate is to publish “interesting, ambitious, and compelling work by Canadian poets, both new and established.” Many books published by Brick have been nominated for awards (check out the complete list here). Most recently, Don Domanski won the Governor General’s Award for Poetry for All Our Wonder Unavenged. In November, Sheri Benning won the City of Saskatoon Award and the Anne Szumigalski Poetry Award for her latest book, Thin Moon Psalm.

Elizabeth Philips, author of Torch River, received two nominations for the Poetry and City of Saskatoon awards. Congratulations to Don Domanski, Sheri Benning, Elizabeth Philips, and Brick Books! Go to the Brick Books website to read about the history of Brick Books and to check out their online catalogue.

Sonia Saikaley's Turkish Delight, Montreal Winter takes the reader from Lebanon’s olive groves to Montreal’s frigid winters and underground malls. These closely connected poems present a narrative threaded with the rich traditions of the Middle East, from its dazzling varied food to its bustling Arabian marketplaces and passionate politics.

A lover longs to be reunited with his beloved. A woman mourns the loss of her father and must find her place in a male-dominated culture, while another must relinquish her unborn child. Honest, accessible, and humane, Turkish Delight, Montreal Winter is a strikingly moving and powerful sequence of poems exploring themes of alienation, intergenerational disconnection, love, and loss.